1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an arithmetic program conversion apparatus, an arithmetic program conversion program and an arithmetic program conversion method for converting the type of variable of an arithmetic program.
2. Description of the Related Art
Floating-point arithmetic is being popularly used in application programs relating to signal processing (for mobile communications, image processing, etc.) to examine and verify systems. In conventional hardware design operations, designers are forced to manually convert a reference of a C program of a fixed floating-point model, for which system verification has been made, into integer arithmetic with a fixed bit width in the HDL (hardware description language).
In recent years, the RTL (register transfer level) automatic synthesis technology (high order synthesis technology) using a C program of a fixed floating-point model has been put to practical use. As for fixed-point arithmetic, fixed-point class libraries have become commercially available so that a good environment has been established for simulations.
Fixed floating-point data generation circuits are known as conventional techniques that relates to the present invention (see, inter alia, Patent Document 1: Jpn. Pat. Appln. Laid-Open Publication No. 2002-149397). Such known fixed-point data generation circuits are adapted to detect the largest value of the exponential parts of a plurality of floating-point data and determine the difference between the largest value and the exponential part of the input floating-point data.
However, the conversion from a floating-point arithmetic to a fixed-point arithmetic has to be done manually. Therefore, it is increasingly difficult to make such conversions to a low cost (small bit width) fixed-point arithmetic, while maintaining the required accuracy level (S/N ratio), as the level of functional sophistication rises.